Florida man linked to Lloyd slaying to be arraigned Monday

Share via e-mail

The Florida man arrested as part of the investigation into former New England Patriots player Aaron Hernandez’s alleged role in the slaying of Odin Lloyd will be arraigned in Attleboro District Court on Monday afternoon, prosecutors said Saturday.

Ernest Wallace, 41, of Miramar, Fla., will be facing a charge of accessory to murder.

Wallace is one of three men prosecutors say were in the car with Lloyd, 27, of Dorchester, hours before he was shot and killed in the early morning of June 17. Lloyd’s body was discovered in a North Attleboro industrial park less than a mile from Hernandez’s house.

On June 26, police arrested Hernandez, who has been charged with first-degree murder and is being held without bail. That same day, they arrested Carlos Ortiz, 27, of Bristol, Conn., and charged him with possession of a firearm without a license.

Days after those arrests, Massachusetts police released Wallace’s name and photo in a public appeal for help locating him and a silver Chrysler 300 he was believed to have been driving.

Within hours, the vehicle was located in Bristol and seized by police. The following day, Wallace walked into the Miramar police station and turned himself in.

“We believe . . . that we now have in custody three individuals who were in the silver Nissan Altima at the time that Odin Lloyd got into the car,” Bristol District Attorney C. Samuel Sutter told reporters after Wallace was brought into custody.

Reached last week, Wallace’s attorney, David Meier, would not comment on whether Wallace would cooperate with police.

Under the Massachusetts joint venture law, anyone present when a crime was committed, had knowledge that a crime was going to be committed, or in any way aided or encouraged a crime being committed is subject to the same legal penalties as the person who committed the crime.

Former district attorneys who are not involved in this investigation have told the Globe that prosecutors could use the threat of more harsh charges against Ortiz or Wallace to get their cooperation in the investigation.

Citing the investigation’s ongoing nature, a spokesman for the Bristol district attorney’s office declined further comment.